UNCLE ALECK.
The marvellous power of Christianity to repeat itself in new forms
apparently variant, and reveal itself under new aspects, or rather its
wonderful fulness and completeness, that enables the different ages of
men, under ever-varying conditions of culture and development, to find
in it their greatest needs supplied, and their highest civilization
advanced, may be an old observation. A change in the theological
thought and speculation of New England was beginning to make its way
to the surface at about the time of the migration of its sons and
daughters to the far-off Ohio wilderness, and many minds carried with
them into the woods a tinge of the new light. Theodore Parker had not
announced the heresy that there was an important difference between
theology and religion, and that life was of more consequence than
creed. But Calvinism had come to mean less to some minds, and there
was another turning back to the great source by strong new seekers,
to whom the accepted formulas had become empty, dry shells, to be
pulverized, and the dead dust kneaded anew with the sweet waters of
the ever fresh fountain. Those who bore the germs of the new thought
to the wild freedom of nature, in the woods, found little to restrain
or direct it; and, as is usual upon the remoulding of religious
thought, while the strong religious nature questions only as to the
true, many of different temperament boldly question the truth of all.
The seeds and sources of a religious revolution are remote, and
its apparent results a generation of heretics and infidels. Heresy
sometimes becomes orthodoxy in its turn, and in its career towards
that, and in its days of zeal and warfare, the infidel often becomes
its convert.
Those in the new colony, who turned to the somewhat softer and sweeter
givings out of the Great Teacher, and to whom these qualities made the
predominant elements of his doctrines, were few in numbers, scattered
and weak, while the mass of the immigrants were staunch in the
theology of their old home. The holders of the new ideas not only
suffered from the odium of all new heresies, but their doctrines were
especially odious, as tending to destroy the wholesome sanctions of
fitting punishments, while, like the teachers of all ideas at variance
with the old, they were surrounded by and confounded with the herd of
old scoffers and unbelievers, who always try to ally themselves
with those who, for any reason, doubt or question the dogmas always
rejected by them.
And so it is that the apostles of a new dogma come to be weighted
with whatever of odium may attach to the old rejectors of the old; and
there is always this bond of sympathy between the new heretic and the
old infidel; they are both opposed to the holders of the old faith,
and hence so far are allies.
In Newbury, in that far-off time, a dozen families, perhaps,
respectable for intelligence and morality, were zealous acceptors of
the new ideas; and about these, to their great scandal, gathered the
straggling, rude spirits and doubtful characters that lightly float on
the wave of emigration, to be dropped wherever that subsides.
The organizing power of the new ideas in itself, was not great. Their
spirit was not, and cannot, be aggressive. They consisted in part of
a rejection of much that made Puritanism intolerant in doctrine, and
that furnished it with its organizing and militant power.
Men organize to do, and not merely to not do. Among the most earnest
in the support of these ideas were Thomas Ridgeley and his wife, who
were also among the most prominent in their neighborhood. Their
public religious exercises were not frequent, and were holden in a
school-house in their vicinity, the most attractive feature of which
was the excellent singing of the small congregation. Mrs. Ridgeley
came from a family of much local celebrity for their vocal powers,
while her husband was not only an accomplished singer, but master of
several instruments, and in the new settlements he was often employed
as a teacher of music.
The preacher of this small congregation was Mr. Alexander, "Uncle
Aleck," as everybody called him, who lived in the west part of the
town, on the border of "the woods." A man well in years, inferior in
person, with a mild, sweet, benevolent face, and blameless, dreamy
life, he spent much time in "sarching the Scripters," as he expressed
it, in constant conversations and mild disputations of Bible texts
and doctrines, and sermonizing at the Sunday assemblies of his
co-believers. He was a man without culture, without the advantage of
much converse with cultivated people, of rather feeble and slender
mental endowments, but of a wonderfully sweet, serene, cheerful
temper, and a most abiding faith. His was a heart and soul whose love
and compassion embraced the created universe. He believed that God
created only to multiply the objects of His own love, and that the
ultimate end of all Providence was to bless, and he did not doubt that
He would manage to have His way. That He had ever generated forces and
powers beyond His control, he did not believe. The gospels, to him,
were luminous with love, mercy, and protecting providence; and while
his sermons were faulty and confused, his language vicious, and his
pronounciation depraved, so that he furnished occasional provocation
to scoffers among the profane, and to critics among the orthodox,
there was always such sweetness and tenderness, and love so broad,
deep, rich and pure, that few earnest or thoughtful minds ever heard
him without being moved and elevated by his benignant spirit.
He was always in converse with the Master in his early ministrations,
in beautiful, far-off, peaceful Galilee. He was a contented and
happy feeder upon the manna and wine of those early wanderings and
preachings among a simple and primitive people; and was forever
lingering away from Jerusalem, and avoiding the final catastrophe,
which he could never contemplate without shuddering horror. No power
on earth could ever convert his simple faith to the idea that this
great sacrifice was an ill-devised scheme to end in final failure; and
he preached accordingly. The elder Ridgeley had been dead many years;
the simple faith had gained few proselytes; Uncle Aleck's sermons made
little impression, and gained nothing in clearness of statement or
doctrine, but ripened and deepened in tenderness and sweetness. His
people remained unpopular, and nothing but the force of character of a
few saved them from personal proscription.
The Ridgeley boys, the older ones, were steady in the faith of their
parents. Morris openly acknowledged it and Henry had been destined
by his father to its teachings; Barton stood by his mother, however he
esteemed her faith, and occasionally said sharp and pungent things of
its opponents, which confirmed the unpopular estimate in which he was
undoubtedly held.
The Markhams were orthodox. Dr. Lyman was a nearly unbelieving
materialist at this time, but had several times "wabbled," as Bart
expressed it, from orthodoxy to infidelity, without touching the
proscribed ground of Uncle Aleck.
Mr. Young was an obsolete revival exhorter, whose life did little
to illustrate and enforce his givings out. He had a weakness for the
elder Scriptures; and hence the irreverent name applied to him in the
boat by Bart.